writing life

Perfectionist Writers

Published on by Kristi Holl

Does perfectionism keep you from getting started on your writing? Does trying to write your best create pressure for you?

If you, you’ll be encouraged something in Art & Fear: Observations On the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking by David Bayles and Ted Orland. It’s about being a perfectionist–and how to deal with the pressure it generates in all artists, including writers. Read about this experiment:

“The ceramics teacher announced on opening day that he was dividing the class into two groups. All those on the left side of the studio, he said, would be graded solely on the quantity of work they produced, all those on the right solely on its quality. His procedure was simple: on the final day of class, he would bring in his bathroom scales and weigh the work of the “quantity” group: fifty pounds of pots rated an “A”, forty pounds a “B”, and so on. Those being graded on “quality”, however, needed to produce only one pot–albeit a perfect one–to get an “A”. Well, came grading time and a curious fact emerged: the works of highest quality were all produced by the group being graded for quantity. It seems that while the “quantity” group was busily churning out piles of work–and learning from their mistakes–the “quality” group had sat theorizing about perfection, and in the end had little more to show for their efforts than grandiose theories and a pile of dead clay.”

Quality from Quantity

Isn’t that a fascinating experiment? I know that we get better by writing more, like a piano player gets better by practicing more. But what struck me is how much more FUN the first group must have had (while at the same time producing superior pots.) They were just trying to create a lot of pots, without any emphasis at all on the finished product.

Could I use the results of this experiment to revamp my own writing that was often stalled by the perfectionist demon?

Reforming the Perfectionist

I decided to try an experiment of my own this morning. Most days I more closely resemble a pot maker from Group B: stewing, not writing, being unhappy with results and scrapping them, judging, blocking, and finally quitting for the day. Today I decided to be a Group A pot-making writer and just relax. I stayed off the Internet till noon and just wrote–a lot. [I had already outlined my book.] My only goal was to produce a lot of pages. I wrote for three hours with intermittent short breaks, and I had fun! From what I can tell, the nice pile of finished pages aren’t half bad either.

I think I’m onto something here! Don’t try to write the Great American Novel today. Just make some pots, lots of pots!

A No-Guilt Writing Life

Published on by Kristi Holl

Does taking time to write make you feel guilty? In her book Writing as a Way of Healing, Louise DeSalvo said, “Many people…have told me that taking time to write seems so, well, self-indulgent, self-involved, frivolous even.”

Does that describe you? Do you fight your own guilty feelings that say you should be doing something more productive? Does writing–especially if you haven’t sold much or aren’t making piles of money from it–feel selfish to you? Do the real (or imagined) opinions of others keep you from spending time writing or making it more of a priority?

The Stages of Guilt

When our children are small, we fight the guilt that comes with motherhood. Are we taking too much time away from the kids? is it really good that they’ve learned to entertain themselves so well? Is it really the responsible thing that my kids are the only ones on the block who know how to run the washing machine and cook meals? Will the children remember Mom as someone without a face, only a hunched back and tapping fingers?

I used to wonder all those things when my kids were small. But we needed the money from the book contracts I was receiving, and at least I was home. (Only technically, it felt sometimes.) You may know the feeling. When you’re writing, you feel like you should be doing crafts or baking with the kids. When you’re making the umpteenth finger painting, you long to be writing.

This Too Shall Pass…or Will It?

Once my children were grown and on their own, I thought the guilt would stop. But I really identified with Carol Rottman in Writers in the Spirit when she said:

“Now all I have to do is quell my guilt over the things I displace because of my indulgence in writing. There are so many worthy causes that regularly tempt me to leave the desk. A sister describes me as ‘driven’ when I am so serious about my work, and friends wonder why I don’t join them for lunch. My children and young grandchildren, all within a twenty-mile radius, can use as much time as I can give.”

The Cure for Guilt

As in so many cases, the cure for guilt seems to be in finding the right balance. Balance between time for writing and time for family/job/home/church/community. Have you found the balance that works for you and your family? It will look different if your children are babies than if they’re teens or adults.

But how do you find that balance and banish the guilt? Take some time on your own and prayerfully answer the following questions:

  1. What/who pushes your guilt buttons when you’re trying to write?
  2. How do you choose whether to keep writing or not?
  3. What questions do you ask yourself in order to find the right balance and keep your priorities straight?
  4. What are you willing to give up of your own in order to make time to write?

Once you’ve decided, make a schedule for your writing, inform friends and family, and then make a firm commitment to banish the guilt. Trust me on this. Even if you now prioritize your days according to guilt (like I did for decades), you can do this. And in a surprisingly short amount of time, when you see the world goes on functioning while you’re writing, the guilt will fade away.

Jane Austen and Me

Published on by Kristi Holl

I got some news last Tuesday that took my breath away.

In the past two years, I’ve written (among other things) four mysteries for adults. Three were part of a historical series. One novel featured Jane Austen.

This week I got an email from a woman in charge of collections at the Jane Austen House Museum in Chawton, England.

It was about my Austen novel, A Dangerous Tide, and her decision to add it to the museum’s Reading Room.

Felt Like a Dream

Sue Dell, from the museum, said the following: “Having reviewed your book we have decided we will place your book on our public shelves in the Reading Room at Jane Austen’s House. It will remain on the shelves for 12 months. We like to show the public that Jane still inspires writers today, and your story is a lovely example of this.”

I read the email several times before it sank in. My novel featuring my all-time favorite author, Jane Austen, is sitting on a shelf in Jane’s house in England, just down the short hallway from the dining room where Jane sat at her tiny, twelve-sided table and wrote Pride and Prejudice,Sense and Sensibility, and others.

I was more thrilled by her email–and my book being placed in their Reading Room–than any award I ever received for a book.

 

Below is a photo of one side of the reading room, and the other photo shows Sue Dell adding A Dangerous Tide to the shelves. [And below that, I’ll share a dozen photos of places in Jane’s house that appear in the book.]

Jane Austen House Museum Reading Room

 

Sue Dell, Collections Volunteer

The Fun of Onsite Research

The events in the book were purely fictional, but the historical setting is accurate, the historical events of the time are real, and the Austen family is based on a lot of research done over the years of enjoying her books and movies and biographies.

For those of you who subscribe to the series (and for my friends who’ve read the book), I thought I’d share some photos of my trip to Jane’s house last September. I have included photos of places featured in the book’s story.

In no particular order then…

Jane Austen House Museum, Chawton, England
Jane’s pony cart
outdoor bakehouse
kitchen hearth
Jane’s upstairs bedroom overlooking court
seeing Jane’s view from her bedroom window
courtyard below Jane’s bedroom; bakehouse opposite
relaxing in the Austen garden

 

Beware! Burnout Ahead

Published on by Kristi Holl

“Writing is not everything,” says Lisa Shearin in Writer Magazine. “And if you want longevity in this business, play isn’t just important–it’s critical. We get so intensely focused on having achieved the dream and working so hard to keep the dream going, that we’re blind to the signs that if we keep going down that road at a fast pace, that dream could quickly turn into a nightmare.”

Recipe for Burnout

I was very glad to read her opinion piece–and I wish that message was published more often. I wish someone had said it to me years ago. Having a healthy drive is good, but letting yourself be driven–by others or your own inner critic or even your perceived budget needs–will eventually ruin the joy you originally brought to your writing.

“Dreams are meant to be savored and enjoyed,” Shearin says. “You do have to work hard, but sometimes, the work can wait.”

Too Late

Great advice, but what if you’re already burned out? What if–from overwork, juggling too many jobs and family members, a major loss, or chronic illness–your ideas have dried up? I’ve been there twice (previously) in my writing life, and it was a scary place to be.

Peggy Simson Curry spoke about this in a Writer Magazine archive article first published in 1967. She detailed the process she followed to “slowly work [her] way back to writing” and discover what had killed her creative urge in the first place.

Face the Fear

I think most writers would agree with Peggy that fear is at the basis of being unable to write–fear that a writer can’t write anything worth publishing. Burned out writers constantly think of writing something that will sell. 

“This insidious thinking,” Curry says, “persuades the writer to question every story idea that comes to him. He no longer becomes excited with glimpses of theme, characters, setting, threads of plot. He can only ask desperately, ‘But who will want it?'”

Healing Choices

Among other suggestions, this writer said it was very important to deliberately get outside, away from the writing, and just enjoy the world around you. In other words, play.

Coming out of burnout can be done, but it often takes methodical, small daily disciplines to do it. For me lately, it’s been watering the tiny vegetable garden my granddaughters helped plant and walking to a nearby pond to watch the turtles (doing nothing) and walk back. Earlier, when my eyesight was better at night, I stitched small quilted wall hangings, and that finally unclogged my creativity. Things that help will be different for each writer. 

I feel the burnout lifting lately. I still tire more quickly, but a little trip to the pond and back seems to revive me and restore that “want to” so important in writing stories. This time, I am determined to keep up the routine, even when I feel better, and avoid the burnout path in the future. It takes less time–and is more FUN–to do these routines when you already feel well than to do twice as much to regain your failing health (mental and/or physical).

So take time for yourself today, even ten minutes here and there. You’ll be so glad that you did!

The Gift of Time

Published on by Kristi Holl

It isn’t my birthday or Christmas or Mother’s Day, but it feels like it today. Why? Because I’ve decided to give myself a wonderful gift now.

The gift of time.

I’ve been writing and publishing since my kids were babies. They’re in their thirties now, with their own children ranging from toddlers to teenagers. During many of my children’s growing-up years, I was either single parenting or the family relied heavily on my income. Slowing down to study my craft was a dream I put on my yearly goals list, but it was rarely an option. The 50+ hours of work per week needed to generate income: writing books, teaching writing, speaking, writing test questions, and doing private critiques.

Always Running, Faster, FASTER!

Whenever I thought about studying more, reading more, taking more time to grow as a writer (versus making every hour a billable hour), I would promise myself, Later, when things slow down and the cash flow eases up.

Even when that day came where I could cut back, I found that the very idea panicked me. I had drummed into my head for so many years that freelancer warning, “If you don’t work, you don’t eat.” You learn to go without paid sick days or paid vacations–let alone time to study one’s craft.

If Not NOW, When?

For several years, I’ve been having a discussion with a dear writing friend about slowing down and spending time to improve our writing. I took motivational workshops, learned how to “work smarter, not harder,” streamlined my work habits, and multi-tasked until I met myself coming and going. And what did I do with the time freed up by all this smarter working? Took on more projects, learned how to blog, Facebook and Twitter…but rarely studied. Oh, I bought craft books, but the books that got my full attention seemed to focus on time management.

And my friend? Except for having grandchildren, she was as busy as I was. Yet she got her MFA in children’s writing (traveling half-way around the world to do it), and is now working on her Ph.D. While I don’t have the money for either of those things, I could certainly be studying more. And that’s where I decided to apply my gift of time.

Spending Vs. Investing Time

Starting today, I am giving myself the gift of time to study. I think if I do four or five hours of writing (the moneymaking activities) in the morning, then I could surely study for an hour every afternoon. To survive in the changing publishing times, we will all need to become better writers. And if not now, when? (By the way, it isn’t something I feel I should do. It’s something I want to do. I honestly do love to study.)

Maybe you can’t afford to work part-time yet. (I’m not positive that I can either. I’ll find out!) I know that situation is a reality for many of us. But if you can squeeze out even a daily hour to read current books in your field and study a writing craft book, I encourage you to do it. I’ve signed up for a writing course online which takes an hour per day, and I can’t wait to be a student again! It’s my gift to me.

Jane Austen and Me

Published on by Kristi Holl

I’ve been thinking about Jane Austen a lot since visiting her home in Chawton, England, in September.

Another time and another place, but some lessons to learn that apply to me as a writer today.

Kinship of Writers

Jane’s home in Chawton was where she revised Sense & Sensibility and Pride & Prejudice for publication. Here she also wrote Emma, Persuasion, Mansfield Park and part of another novel before becoming ill. After visiting Jane’s house in Chawton, I felt a kinship with her. She lived in the kind of home I would have loved (see below): several hundred years old, two stories, cozy fireplaces in every room, big flower and vegetable gardens, set on a cobblestone street lined with tiny shops and thatched-roof cottages.

Her writing desk (above) was tiny. I was struck by the contrast between her small desk, just big enough for her paper and ink well, and my two desks back home covered with computers, printers, books, notebooks, and assorted junk. Jane had no shelves of how-to writing books, no writing room of her own, no Internet or cell phone.

Routines

She wrote in the mornings, after breakfast, before helping her mother and sister with household tasks or visiting or entertaining numerous nieces and nephews. She put her writing first in her day, before it got taken over by friends or family or other obligations. There was a lesson for me!

She also wrote about what she knew and experienced–and what interested her–despite pressure from her publisher to write what would make more money. They wanted gothic and historical romances, not her “simple little stories” about her everyday village life and how several families affected each other. (Remember: although her books are historical to her present-day fans, she was writing contemporary fiction.) Her heroes and heroines who learned about their character flaws and overcame them–like Darcy’s pride and Lizzie’s tendency toward hasty judgments–were considered too tame for the reading public.

Write Your Passion

I loved reading Jane’s responses to the publisher’s pressure. Her replies (there were photocopies of her letters) basically said that she could only write what they wanted if she were literally starving, and even though historical romances might be more popular or profitable than her “domestic stories of country villages…I would hang myself before I could finish the first chapter…No, I must keep to my own style and go on in my own way, though I may never succeed again.” Wouldn’t that same publisher be astounded today to see the thousands of fans who still flock to the Jane Austen walking tours in Bath, the Jane Austen Centre, and her home in Chawton, who buy her books and watch movies made of them? Isn’t there a lesson for all writers here?

Perhaps this is what Jane was thinking when she wrote (in Mansfield Park):

“We have all a better guide in ourselves, if we would attend to it, than any other person can be.”

Successes and Setbacks

Published on by Kristi Holl

“The only copy of your manuscript is stolen from your car. Articles and stories come back with unfailing rejection…Finances grow ever more perilous. This is, with variations, the script for the first ten or fifteen years of many successful writers’ careers. But they hung on.”

This quote comes from one of my favorite book of meditations for writers called Walking on Alligators. It talks about the nearly universal experience of published writers: their successes are interspersed with fairly regular setbacks.

Have you accepted that truth yet?

Re-framing Failure

Even though the overall pattern of your writing experiences will probably be upward (assuming you don’t quit), it will be full of ups and downs. Ups will include sales and good reviews and awards. The downs–those drops on the chart–include rejections and delays and canceled contracts.

The setbacks are NOT failures or reasons to quit–unless you allow them to be. They’re both places of learning and places of rest. They are simply steps on the way to the top. More importantly, they can have a positive effect.

Upside of Down Times

Compare it to climbing a mountain. It’s usually an up-and-down experience as you work your way to the top. There are periods where you climb upward steadily. Sometimes you also go down–lose a bit of altitude–before starting the next steep climb. Are the downhill stretches failures? No. Setbacks? Not really, although it can feel like that.

Downhill spots have their bright side though. For example, when I “fail” to sell something, it forces me to slow down and ask some questions. And more than one time, the failure to sell a series idea gave me an initial disappointment (lasting about five minutes) followed by a rush of relief that I didn’t have to force my exhausted body into another grueling writing stint just yet. The setbacks can be restful, if we let them be. They can allow you to recoup some energy.

The periods in our writing life that seem “down” can also be times to rethink and regroup. Maybe we need a course correction. Perhaps that rejection is trying to point us in a new direction in our writing. Or that negative review might be telling us that our real love (and talent) is in writing poetry, not baby board books.

But It’s Worse Than That!

What about when the negatives are too frequent? As Harriet Beecher Stowe once said: “When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you until it seems that you cannot hold on for a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.” Judging from personal experience, I have to agree with her.

Have you ever seen a negative happening (bad critique, rejection, few people coming to your workshop, etc.) be transformed into something positive? No need to give specific names or publications, but can you share an unwanted writing experience that turned out, in some way, to be a good thing?

The Completion Stage

Published on by Kristi Holl

The past two weeks, I’ve talked about the stages we go through in our writing projects, including the challenges at each stage and ways to keep from derailing. After we have prepared the work-in-progress, let it germinate, worked on it, then deepened and shaped it, we are ready to complete the work.

“There is a completion stage,” Louise de Salvo says in Writing as a Way of Healing, “during which we again revise, revisit, rethink, and refashion. .. Often the drive to finish a work takes precedence over other needs and obligations—like being social or taking showers or eating well.” She said her sons used to call this her “demented stage” because she was so completely involved in her work.

Derail or Finish? That Is the Question

During the completion stage, you can derail your process several ways:

  • If you work needlessly, refusing to let go of your writing project and send it out into the world, your book can fail to be published out of fear. (The “world” can mean your critique partner, your agent, or an editor.) You know in your gut that you’ve made the book as good as you’re able at this point in your learning curve, and that continuing to work on the book is probably not helping it much. In fact, if you keep tinkering needlessly, you can do more harm than good.
  • If you lose interest in your work at this point, you may sadly end up putting the manuscript on a shelf in your closet “to work on later,” only later never comes. Instead of this solution, you must find ways to rekindle your original enthusiasm for your book. If you kept a work journal for this project, go back and read your original notes and hopes for this book.
  • If you become careless during this stage, you might not do the necessary polishing or changing that deep revisions call for. You might settle for a good manuscript or story, but not rise to the excellence you’re capable of at this point in your career. If you find yourself reading through your manuscript and being jolted by certain paragraphs or sentences—yet go on by, hoping no one else will notice the jerky rhythm or unclear sentence—then you’re becoming careless. This can derail your project.

It makes no sense to spend weeks, months, or years writing and then, when finishing, to produce a slovenly, careless effort. During the completion stage, you must fine tune what is there. You must pay attention to detail at this stage. It can be a “slow, meticulous, often plodding process,” says Ms. de Salvo. Yet it is necessary. “Finishing strong is something great athletes learn… Finishing strong is something writers also must learn.”

The Deepening and Shaping Stages

Published on by Kristi Holl

In this series we’re discussing the seven specific stages you go through from beginning to end with a writing project. There is potential for both growth and failure at each stage.

(First read about the preparation stage, the germination stage, and the working stage.)

Deepening and Shaping

At the beginning of the deepening stage, you’ve already completed a rough draft. You may also have done some fixing on your draft, especially if you zipped through the rough draft at lightning speed, just getting it down as fast as you can. You may need to go back, fill in missing parts, rearrange some things.

If you’re a writer who writes a bit, then revises that bit before going on, your first finished draft was actually revised as you went along. Either way, it’s time to get down to some deeper work now. The deepening stage is more challenging, but very satisfying!

According to Louise de Salvo in Writing as a Way of Healing, in this deepening stage “we revisit, rethink, re-imagine, and revise what we’ve been doing. Often during this stage we learn what our project is really about, even if we’ve been working on it for years.” There is also a shaping stage, according this author, “during which we find the work’s order and form.”

Be Aware: Potential for Growth…and Failure

This is hard work, and these stages require a lot of deep thinking. During these stages, I tend to read books about deepening characters, or books on emotional structure and character arcs. I might study books on voice as I rethink various characters and how they’re coming across. There is potential for much growth during this period.

The dangers during the deepening and shaping stages have to do with maintaining our interest in the writing project. By now, we may be tired of the story, even sick of it, and the thought of going through the novel one or two or more times makes us want to run screaming into the woods.

If your enthusiasm diminishes, you must find ways to reignite it instead of abandoning the work. Read about the writing processes of other writers. You’ll see that you’re not alone by any means with the struggles of this stage. And give yourself credit–even celebrate–each new mini-completion you accomplish. It doesn’t feel like we’re making progress–we aren’t adding new pages now. However, each time you go through the manuscript and shape a bit here, cut a bit there, deepen that character’s motivation, enhance the outdoor scenery, or whatever you feel needs to be done–you are making progress. It is getting closer to the vision you had way back when you started the novel.

It’s a bit like the transition stage of having a baby–you’re sick of the whole process and would like to quit and go home–but you’re so close to holding the baby. Remember that with your book too. The deepening and shaping stages are bringing you ever closer to holding that finished book in your hands.

The Working Stage

Published on by Kristi Holl

(Last week we started talking about the seven specific stages you go through from beginning to end with a writing project, and the potential for both growth and failure at each stage. First read about the preparation stage, then the germination stage.)

The Work-Out

Next we have the working stage, the one we’re probably most familiar with. During this phase we begin our rough draft, build on it, flesh it out, develop our plots and characters, and often fly by the seat of our pants to cross the finish line.

Sometimes we see our way clear through this phrase, especially if we are voracious outliners. If you hate outlines, this working stage may be more nebulous as you discover your story. You may get lost and have to start over a few times. But eventually you’ll have a rough draft, a completed draft with a beginning, middle, climax and end.

You might get the draft critiqued at this point, or you might revise your draft first, smoothing out rough spots, fleshing out the cardboard characters, and building the tension at the climax scene. The working stage is a longer stage, an exciting stage.

Danger! Danger! Warning! Warning!

What are the dangers during the working stage, the attitudes and behaviors that can derail our writing projects? There are many! Depending on your personality and favored way of working, you may do some of the following:

  • You may slavishly follow your outline instead of your instincts and creative impulses that encourage you to take detours.
  • You may derail during the working stage if you work zealously and with high anxiety. Working at a fever pitch, without taking time for relaxation, will cause burn-out and writer’s block just from exhaustion.
  • If you don’t learn to push through the confusion of this stage, you may abandon your project. All rough drafts and early revisions are confusing as you figure out what you’re really trying to say, where to put certain scenes and information, and what to do with the new characters and incidents that seem to spring full-blown from your unconscious mind.
  • If you are writing your rough draft with your Editorial Mind in gear, you will eventually give up. Editorial Mind is critical, which is an important trait later, but judging your work during your rough draft working stage can be lethal.
  • If you spend time thinking about the finished product (selling, publishing) when you’re trying to write, you won’t enjoy the process, and you’ll be very critical of everything you write. Instead, focus on enjoying the writing process and leave the “product” work until the last stage (the going-public stage).

“Sometimes,” author Louise de Salvo says in Writing as a Way of Healing, “writers mistakenly assume the work is finished when the working stage is over. But for us to do our finest, most authentic work, we must proceed further.”

We’ll discuss those deepening and shaping stages next.